Design of Reliable

Communication Solutions for

Wireless Sensor Networks

Managing Interference in Unlicensed Bands

LUCA STABELLINI

Licentiate Thesis inRadio Communication Systems

Stockholm, Sweden 2009

Design of Reliable Communication Solutions for

Wireless Sensor Networks

Managing Interference in Unlicensed Bands

LUCA STABELLINI

Licentiate Thesis in

Radio Communication Systems

Stockholm, Sweden 2009

TRITA–ICT–COS–0901ISSN 1653–6347ISRN KTH/COS/R--09/01--SE

KTH Communication SystemsSE-100 44 Stockholm

SWEDEN

Akademisk avhandling som med tillstånd av Kungl Tekniska högskolan framläggestill offentlig granskning för avläggande av teknologie licentiatexamen i radiosys-temteknik fredagen den 15 May 2009 klockan 14.00 i sal C1, Electrum1, KungligaTekniska Högskolan, Isafjordsgatan 26, Kista.

© Luca Stabellini, May 2009

Tryck: Universitetsservice US AB

i

Abstract

Recent surveys conducted in the context of industrial automationhave outlined that reliability concerns represent today one of the majorbarriers to the diffusion of wireless communications for sensing and con-trol applications: this limits the potential of wireless sensor networksand slows down the adoption of this new technology. Overcoming theselimitations requires that awareness on the causes of unreliability andon the possible solutions to this problem is created. With this respect,the main factor responsible for the perceived unreliability is radio in-terference: low-power communications of sensor nodes are in fact verysensitive to bad channel conditions and can be easily corrupted by trans-missions of other co-located devices. In this thesis we investigate differ-ent techniques that can be exploited to avoid interference or mitigateits effects.

We first consider interference avoidance through dynamic spectrumaccess: more specifically we focus on the idea of channel surfing anddesign algorithms that allow sensor nodes to identify interfered chan-nels, discover their neighbors and maintain a connected topology inmulti-channel environments. Our investigation shows that detectingand thus avoiding interference is a feasible task that can be performedby complexity and power constrained devices. In the context of spec-trum sharing, we further consider the case of networked estimation andaim at quantifying the effects of intra-network interference, induced bycontention-based medium access, over the performance of an estimationsystem. We show that by choosing in an opportune manner their prob-ability of transmitting, sensors belonging to a networked control systemcan minimize the average distortion of state estimates.

In the second part of this thesis we focus on frequency hopping tech-niques and propose a new adaptive hopping algorithm. This implementsa new approach for frequency hopping: in particular rather than aim-ing at removing bad channels from the adopted hopset our algorithmuses all the available frequencies but with probabilities that depend onthe experienced channel conditions. Our performance evaluation showsthat this approach outperforms traditional frequency hopping schemesas well as the adaptive implementation included in the IEEE 802.15.1radio standard leading to a lower packet error rate.

Finally, we consider the problem of sensor networks reprogrammingand propose a way for engineering a coding solution based on fountaincodes and suitable for this challenging task. Using an original geneticapproach we optimize the degree distribution of the used codes so asto achieve both low overhead and low decoding complexity. We furtherengineer the implementation of fountain codes in order to allow the

ii

recovery of corrupted information through overhearing and improve theresilience of the considered reprogramming protocol to channel errors.

Acknowledgements

This has been so far an amazing journey and I’m quite pleased to admit that thelast two years and a half have both required from me and given to me more thanI expected. I would like to take this opportunity to thank some of the people thathave supported me during my studies. My sincere gratitude goes to my advisor,Prof. Jens Zander: beside always providing relevant comments that have greatlyimproved the quality of my work I want to thank you Jens for giving me theopportunity to undertake this challenging experience. I’m grateful to Prof. MikaelJohansson (Automatic Control Lab, KTH) and Prof. Andreas Kassler (ComputerScience Department, Karlstad University) respectively for reviewing my Licentiateproposal and accepting the role of opponent in my Licentiate thesis defense.

I also would like to thank Dr. Alexandre Proutiere (Microsoft Research) andProf. Riku Jäntti (TKK) for providing valuable feedback on draft versions of someof the papers included in this thesis. Many thanks to Michele Rossi, Ömer Ileri andMaben Rabi who have closely collaborated with me. I should not forget all the col-leagues and former colleagues at the radio communication department: Pietro Lun-garo, Johan Hultell, Bogdan Timus, Klas Johansson, Mats Blomgren, Ali Özyagciand Aurelian Bria just to mention some of them.

For computer support and administrative matters I am grateful to Irina Rad-ulescu, Niklas Olsson, Lise-Lotte Wahlberg, Ulla Eriksson and Robin Gehrke.

A huge thank to my father, my grandmother and my sister, for supporting mein all the choices I’ve made. Finally, last but not least, for her continuous capabilityof understanding me and tolerating my difficult mood and for the amazing effortshe made to put even the most difficult situation under the best perspective, I’mindebted to Elfrid.

iii

Contents

Acknowledgements iii

Contents iv

List of Tables vi

List of Figures vii

I 1

1 Introduction 3

1.1 Background . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31.2 “High Level“ Problem Formulation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61.3 Overview of Thesis Contributions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 101.4 Thesis Outline . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13

2 Interference Avoidance Through Dynamic Spectrum Access 15

2.1 Related Literature . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 152.2 Energy Efficient Detection of Intermittent Interference in Wireless

Sensor Networks (Paper 1) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 172.3 Interference Aware Self-Organization for Wireless Sensor Networks:

a Reinforcement Learning Approach (Paper 2) . . . . . . . . . . . . 212.4 Energy Optimal Neighbor Discovery for Single Radio Single Channel

Wireless Sensor Networks (Paper 3) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24

3 An Example of Spectrum Sharing: the Case of Networked Esti-

mation 27

3.1 Related Literature . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 273.2 Networked Estimation Under Contention-Based Medium Access (Pa-

per 4) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28

4 Utility Based Adaptive Frequency Hopping 31

iv

CONTENTS v

4.1 Related Literature . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 314.2 Utility Based Adaptive Frequency Hopping (Paper 5) . . . . . . . . . 32

5 Energy and Complexity Aware Design of Fountain Codes for

Sensor Network Reprogramming 35

5.1 Background and Related Literature . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 355.2 SYNAPSE: A Network Reprogramming Protocol for Wireless Sensor

Networks Using Fountain Codes (Paper 6) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 385.3 Seed Optimization . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40

6 Conclusions 45

6.1 Concluding Remarks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 456.2 Future Work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46

Bibliography 47

II Paper Reprints 53

7 Energy Efficient Detection of Intermittent Interference in Wire-

less Sensor Networks 55

8 Interference Aware Self Organization for Wireless Sensor Net-

works: a Reinforcement Learning Approach 69

9 Energy Optimal Neighbor Discovery for Single-Channel Single

Radio Wireless Sensor Networks 77

10 Networked Estimation Under Contention Based Medium Access 85

11 Utility Based Adaptive Frequency Hopping 109

12 SYNAPSE, A Network Reprogramming Protocol for Wireless

Sensor Networks Using Fountain Codes 117

List of Tables

1.1 Barriers to the use of wireless industrial technologies. . . . . . . . . . . 7

5.1 Optimized Sparse Degree Distribution K = 128 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38

vi

List of Figures

1.1 Standards used for industrial sensing applications [11]. . . . . . . . . . . 41.2 Overview of the problem area. The shaded area identifies the three

techniques considered in this thesis. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10

2.1 Sketch of the two regions (continuous lines) C and I defined on ID.The two dashed lines define two iso-curves that correspond to PI(ψ) =PI(ψMax) and PI(ψ) = PI(ψTol). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18

2.2 Sketch of the channel sensing strategy used by our interference detectionscheme. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19

2.3 Contour plot of PI = 0.95 over the interference domain (black line) andexperimentally estimated PI . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20

2.4 Average number of slots required in order to achieve a connected networkfor different kind of policies. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23

2.5 Average energy cost for the optimal power and contention window se-lection policy. Different number of cones are considered. . . . . . . . . . 25

3.1 The estimation problem setup: the states of N identical plants are es-timated via samples transmitted over a shared channel. Samples couldbe delayed and potentially lost because of contention. . . . . . . . . . . 29

3.2 Sample loss rate in a fully synchronized system and periodic sampling.Slotted Aloha is used at the MAC layer. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29

3.3 Average estimation distortion Je as a function of the sampling period hfor an unstable system. Nodes are synchronized and use slotted Aloha. . 30

4.1 Packet Error Rate as a function of average received SNR. . . . . . . . . 33

5.1 Degree Distribution implemented in SYNAPSE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 395.2 E[N ] for different seed sets. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 415.3 Data dissemination over multiple hops. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 425.4 E[N ] using seeds belonging to R∗ and R3 for K ′ = 36. Vertical bars

indicate 95% confidence intervals. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 435.5 Recovery probability using seeds belonging to R∗ and R3 for K ′ = 36.

Vertical bars indicate 95% confidence intervals. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44

vii

Part I

1

Chapter 1

Introduction

1.1 Background

A wireless sensor network (WSN) is a network comprising at least two nodes thatintegrate sensing, communication and computing capabilities [1]. This kind ofnetwork stands out as a promising alternative to wired systems in a multitude ofapplication scenarios ranging from industrial and building automation to healthmonitoring and has been identified as one of the ten emerging technologies thatwill most affect the way we live and work in the next years [2]. The use of wirelesscommunications provides in fact several benefits with respect to traditional wiredsolutions and for instance allows for wiring and installation cost reduction of up to90% [3], [4].

Several market forecasts1 have recently considered the possible evolution of sen-sor network technologies and predicted for the next few years exponential growthsleading to a multi-billion dollar market2. These projections however appear ratheroptimistic as outlined by recent surveys conducted in the context of industrial au-tomation ( [6], [11]): while highlighting how this market has been constantly grow-ing during the last years these studies also remark that the adoption of wirelesstechnologies for sensing and control industrial applications is still moderate. Sucha limited penetration might depend on the lack of a “killer“ application capable ofboosting the development of sensor networks but also on the existence of concretebarriers that practically limit the potential of WSNs ( [5]). We can classify suchbarriers within the following categories:

1These include “On World Expert survey - WSN Market size in 2007“ and “Active RFIDand Sensor Networks 2007-2017“ published by IDTechEx. ON World predicts a total market forWSN industrial applications of 4.6B$ by 2011 and a slightly more pessimistic figure for the SmartBuilding scenario (2.5B$ by 2011). IDTechEx foresees a total market size for WSNs and activeRFID of about 4B$ by 2012. More figures are presented in [5].

2R&D investments alone are expected to grow from 522M$ in 2007 to 1.3B$ in 2012.havingas main drivers energy management in the US and the potential for health care applications inEU countries.

3

4 CHAPTER 1. INTRODUCTION

IEEE 802.15.1

Proprietary

ZigBee

IEEE 802.11x

Others

IEEE 802.15.4

Figure 1.1: Standards used for industrial sensing applications [11].

• Standardization Issues: a big standardization effort has been made dur-ing the last years as witnessed by the increasing proliferation of new stan-dards for sensing applications including for instance IEEE 802.15.4 [7], IEEE802.15.1 [8], 6loWPAN [9], Wireless HART [10], ISA SP-100 and ZigBee [12].Nevertheless the lack of standards and of a unifying set of specifications atthe radio and network level, is still perceived as one of the barriers for thelarge scale diffusion of sensor networks [11]. This problematic issue is howeverexpected to vanish in the near future: the low-power, low-rate IEEE 802.15.4radio standard and ZigBee, that according to a recent survey already representmore than 50% of the market (see Figure 1.1), are in fact steadily emergingas the prevalent choice for industrial and smart building applications.

• Technical Issues: the two main challenges in this context are energy man-agement and communication reliability. We here briefly discuss these twoaspects.Energy Management: sensor nodes are typically battery powered and thisrepresents a drawback with respect to traditional wired systems. Batteriesneed to be periodically replaced. Such operation results in additional mainte-nance costs and for specific applications it might not be economically feasible:in these cases nodes might have to be treated as disposable devices and in or-der to avoid costly maintenance new sensors might have to be deployed oncethe existing ones run out of power. Replacing batteries might further rep-resent a non-trivial task for instance if nodes are operating in environmentspresenting harsh conditions (high temperature or pressure). In order to mit-

1.1. BACKGROUND 5

igate these problems two directions are currently investigated. On one sideconsiderable research effort aims at maximizing battery lifetime through en-ergy aware design of sensor’s hardware, protocols and applications. With thisrespect the use of wireless communications has been identified as the majorsource of energy consumption: optimizing the design and the usage of theradio unit of sensor motes is therefore a key issue that has to be addressed.On the other hand the design of devices with energy harvesting capabilitiesis investigated3.Communication Reliability: the potential unreliability of wireless commu-nications has been identified by recent surveys as one of the major barriers forthe diffusion of wireless technologies in the context of industrial automation4.Many concerns are due to the harsh nature of the wireless channel, wherefading induced by multipath propagation or scattering might lead to packetlosses: in this context we remark that the site where sensors are deployedmight be dictated by the requirements of the specific application and it mightnot be possible to optimize the deployment of a sensor network accountingfor propagation aspects. With this respect, self configuration capabilitiesmight be exploited by nodes to establish and maintain a connected networkeven in environments presenting adverse propagation characteristics.

Nowadays the main issue connected to reliability is however the interferencegenerated by other co-located wireless devices. In fact, low power communi-cations of sensor nodes are easily corrupted by transmissions of other wirelessterminals operating in their close proximity and on the same frequency band.We remark that this problem has been tremendously enhanced during thelast years due to the increasing proliferation of wireless devices that has ledto overcrowded scenarios in the few available unlicensed spectrum bands. Inthis context, examples of crowded spectrum can be easily identified for in-stance considering the 2.4 GHz ISM band and the problem of coexistenceamong the IEEE 802.15.4 sensor standard and other WLAN (IEEE 802.11b/g) or WPAN (IEEE 802.15.1) technologies that due to their higher trans-mission power, if co-located with IEEE 802.15.4-based sensor networks, canbasically annihilate their communication capabilities5.

3The potential of different sources of ambient energy has been recently investigated: theseinclude solar, eolic, thermal and vibrational energy (see for instance [13], [14]). Sensor nodeswith energy harvesting capabilities are today commercially available and manufactured by severalcompanies such as AmbioSystems, Crossbow and Enocean.

4Reliability was mentioned as a concern for the adoption of wireless sensing and control tech-nologies by 43% of the respondents in [6]. Additionally during a survey conducted by ON World in2005, 90% of respondents expressed their worries for the unreliability of wireless communications.

5In this context several experimental studies have been conducted in order to evaluate theactual performance degradation induced by interference over sensor communications. Authorsof [25] report that interference generated by WiFi terminals (IEEE 802.11b/g) can lead to apacket error rate of up to 58% in IEEE 802.15.4-based wireless sensor networks. A similar studyconducted by Crossbow ( [16]) outlined that co-located WiFi networks can increase of 15% packetlosses in ZigBee networks.

6 CHAPTER 1. INTRODUCTION

We remark that energy management and communication reliability are twoconnected issues. Unreliable communications lead to packet losses that willrequire retransmissions: this increases the usage of the radio unit and con-sequently increases the energy consumption of sensor nodes. Therefore, inorder to achieve the highest energy efficiency, the loss of packets induced byinterference has to be prevented.

• Cost Issues: as previously outlined the use of wireless technologies has thepotential to significantly reduce expenditures due to wiring that for severalsettings represent a large fraction of the total application cost. In many caseshowever the cost of wireless sensors (which is mainly given by the cost for thesensor itself, the physical packaging and the battery, while the radio unit hasbasically negligible impact) is still significantly higher than expected. Marketforecasts (see for instance [17]) predict that the cost for wireless nodes is goingto constantly decrease during the next 2-3 years and that by 2011 the cost ofa single node might vary between 50$ (for a simple lighting sensor) and 350$-700$ (for more complex industrial nodes). These figures are still significantlyhigher if compared to early optimistic estimates6 that were targeting a costper sensor in the order of 10$ by 2010.

• Other Consumer Concerns: these include a large variety of issues rang-ing from the difficulties for embracing a new technology, that might not besufficiently known or easy to use, to privacy and security concerns connectedto the fact that data that might be confidential are transmitted over an openand potentially insecure medium such as the wireless channel.

As an example, Table 1.1 presents the barriers for the diffusion of industrial wirelesstechnologies identified during a recent survey [6].

1.2 “High Level“ Problem Formulation

As mentioned above, interference concerns represent a serious issue in the contextof wireless sensor networks: we here discuss in more detail a typical applicationscenario, highlighting the main motivations for this problem and outlining possiblesolutions.

The “Interference Arena“

Data presented in Figure 1.1 show that more than 70% of the wireless nodes de-ployed for industrial sensing applications communicate using the 2.4 GHz ISM band.

6Alan Broad, Crossbow, Wireless Sensor Networks in Industry, available online at http://www.citris-uc.org/system/files?file=Day-1-10-Alan-Broad--Wireless-Sensor-Net.pdf.

1.2. “HIGH LEVEL“ PROBLEM FORMULATION 7

Table 1.1: Barriers to the use of wireless industrial technologies.

Barrier % of RespondentsData Security 45.8

Reliability 43.0Too little knowledge 27.5

Too few industrial products 19.7Too expensive 14.8

Technology might not be available in the future 13.4Data transmission too slow 12.0

Communication distance too short 12.0Too few frequency channels 7.0

Other reasons 9.2There are no barriers 16.9

We have no requirements 24.6

This spectrum band, is unlicensed and thus open for use to all wireless devices thatcomply with a set of basic rules defined by spectrum regulators and for instancespecifying the maximum power that terminals can use while transmitting. The opennature of such frequency band is an extremely attractive feature since it allows theuse of the wireless medium without requiring a potentially expensive license andin fact during the last few years, several radio standards operating in this areaof the spectrum have been defined. In such a scenario, different co-located wire-less devices might interfere with each others and packet transmissions of differentnetworks might collide.

We remark however that effects of interference might be highly asymmetric. Aswe have mentioned above, spectrum regulators limit the maximum allowed trans-mission power, however the actual power level used for packet transmissions de-pends on the specific requirements of the considered application. In some cases,users demand a high data rate or a long transmission range: this might requirea high transmission power and eventually a large bandwidth. In other scenariosinstead, a lower power level and a smaller bandwidth can be used in low-data rateand short-range communications to decrease energy consumption and prolong theduration of batteries: this is usually the case for sensor networks. As an example,the IEEE 802.15.4 radio standard defines a maximum transmission power equal to1mW. Such a value is well below the allowed threshold that is set to 100mW in Eu-rope and 1W in the US and that corresponds to the maximum power level specifiedfor transmissions of 802.11b/g devices. A collision arising among packets transmit-ted by terminals operating within these two standards will likely induce asymmetricconsequences: an 802.11 receiver might only be marginally affected by transmis-sions of co-located 802.15.4 devices, and packets involved in collisions might becaptured and correctly received with high probability. Instead, an 802.15.4 receivermight experience severe interference in presence of high power 802.11 transmissions

8 CHAPTER 1. INTRODUCTION

that might corrupt the received packets inducing a high packet error rate7.We note that terminals might act selfishly and might not be willing to cooperate

for instance transmitting without accounting for the interference that they generateto others: in such a scenario, energy constrained sensor nodes will basically bedominated by other less constrained devices and will have to adopt solutions foravoiding or mitigating effects of interference.

Mitigating or Avoiding Interference

Several approaches can be implemented for dealing with this problem: a first highlevel distinction can be made among centralized and distributed techniques. Inthe first case, potential conflicts arising among different devices are solved in acentralized manner by allocating the set of available spectral resources so as toavoid (or minimize) interference8. If instead the second strategy is implemented,nodes deal with interference in a distributed way; two options are possible in thislast case, in particular cooperative or non-cooperative schemes can be envisaged:

• Cooperative techniques require cooperation among the different users involved(for instance the nodes of a sensor network and WLAN terminals) that mightagree to share a certain portion of the spectrum in the time or frequencydomain9.

• Non-cooperative schemes instead do not involve cooperation among the dif-ferent networks that are competing for the available resources and might thusbe suitable for the scenario we consider, where selfish and heterogeneous10

users need to share an unlicensed band.

7We here have carried out some simple considerations based only on the maximum transmittingpower levels specified by these two standards. The problem of coexistence among 802.15.4 and802.11 is in fact extremely more complex and the effects caused by mutual interference dependon many factors such as the effective path gain among the considered transmitters and receivers(determined by the relative location of the devices of the involved networks), the frequency offsetbetween the carriers used, the actual transmission power levels (power control algorithm can beimplemented in both kind of devices in order to reduce energy consumption), traffic loads and themodulation used at the physical layer by 802.11 devices. These parameters are taken into accountduring the investigation included in Annex E of [7]: the presented results actually confirm theexistence of the asymmetry we have outlined.

8A commonly adopted centralized solution is frequency planning, where orthogonal channelsare assigned to different co-located networks. Frequency planning is today implemented in manyindustrial plants but it might not be effective if nodes are mobile or if interference is generate bydevices that do not comply with the established frequency allocation (for instance terminals thatare not part of the set of devices considered during the planning procedure and act selfishly whiletransmitting). Additionally, if more and more nodes are deployed, frequency planning solutionsmight not be scalable.

9As an example several cooperative techniques aiming at mitigating interference among theIEEE 802.11 and IEEE 802.15.1 radio standards have been proposed by the 802.15 Task Group 2(TG2): examples are the medium access control enhanced temporal algorithm (META) and thealternating wireless medium access schemes (AWMA)( [18]).

10As previously outlined users might be heterogeneous for instance in terms of data rate re-quirements, transmitting power level and energy constraints.

1.2. “HIGH LEVEL“ PROBLEM FORMULATION 9

We here focus on the non-cooperative case: a broad variety of techniques be-long to this category. Spread spectrum modulations schemes represent a commonlyadopted solution. Direct sequence (DSSS) and frequency hopping (FHSS) spreadspectrum transmission techniques allow to achieve a certain resilience against in-terference and are today widely adopted by many radio standards for personalarea network devices: for instance the direct sequence solution is used by the IEEE802.15.4 standard while frequency hopping is implemented in IEEE 802.15.1. Com-binations of these two approaches are also possible and are for instance included inthe Wireless HART and TSMP specifications ( [19]). Another approach that hasrecently received significant attention involves the use of Dynamic Spectrum Ac-cess (DSA) mechanisms: in this case sensor nodes identify and consequently avoidtransmissions of other devices and opportunistically access the wireless mediumexploiting “spectrum holes“ ( [32]) in the time or frequency domain. Ultra WideBand (UWB) sensor networks, utilizing the underlay approach for spectrum access,have also been recently considered and for instance an UWB physical layer has beenincluded in the latest 802.15.4a specifications [20]. Channel coding is an additionalalternative: transmissions of sensor nodes might be encoded by adding redundantinformation that can potentially be exploited at the receiver side to recover cor-rupted packets. Other schemes such as power control or rate adaptation could beused as well but might not be suitable for complexity constrained devices such assimple sensor nodes that might not be able to modify their transmission rate. Fi-nally, more high-layer solutions might also be adopted and for instance interferencecould be avoided through opportunistic routing. Once nodes detect that a certainlink is experiencing interference, an alternative path could be identified and usedto avoid the interfered area by implementing a spatial retreat scheme [21].

Scope of Thesis

In this thesis we consider the energy efficient design of non-cooperative and dis-tributed schemes that energy and complexity constrained sensor nodes can adoptfor avoiding or mitigating effects of interference in unlicensed bands. In particularwe investigate the potential of three of the aforementioned techniques as highlightedin Figure 1.2.

In chapters 2 and 3 we focus on dynamic spectrum access. Chapter 2 defines aDSA-like scheme that implements the idea of channel surfing and aims at avoidinginterference through the exploitation of spectrum holes in the frequency domain:special emphasis is given to energy efficient spectrum sensing and neighbor discoveryin multi-channel networks. In chapter 3 we consider as an example of distributedspectrum sharing the problem of networked estimation and investigate how a setof estimation plants that share a common channel can mitigate the intra-networkinterference originated by the contention-based protocol adopted at the MAC layer.

Chapter 4 deals with frequency hopping transmission techniques and proposesan interference aware adaptive frequency hopping algorithm.

Finally chapter 5 is devoted to the design of an original and energy efficient

10 CHAPTER 1. INTRODUCTION

Interference Avoidance Techniques

Cen

tral

ized

Sch

emes

Fre

quen

cyP

lannin

g

...

Distributed Schemes

Cooperative Solutions

Non-Cooperative Solutions

UW

B

DSSS

FH

SS

DSA

Chan

nel

Cod

ing

Spat

ial

Ret

reat

META AWMA ...

Figure 1.2: Overview of the problem area. The shaded area identifies the threetechniques considered in this thesis.

coding solution tailored to sensor devices and suitable for the challenging problemof sensor networks reprogramming.

1.3 Overview of Thesis Contributions

This thesis is a compilation of 4 conference papers and 2 journal articles: eachchapter briefly outlines the contributions and limitations of the studies presentedin the attached papers.

Chapter 2

Chapter 2 focuses on interference avoidance through dynamic spectrum access.With this respect, different sub-problems have been addressed in the followingpapers:

• Paper 1: Luca Stabellini, Jens Zander, “Energy Efficient Detection of Inter-mittent Interference in Wireless Sensor Networks“, submitted to InternationalJournal on Sensor Networks (IJSNET), March 2009.

• Paper 2: Luca Stabellini, Jens Zander, “Interference-Aware Self-Organizationfor Wireless Sensor Networks: a Reinforcement Learning Approach“, in Pro-ceedings of 4th annual IEEE Conference on Automation Science and Engi-neering (CASE), August 23-26,2008. Washington DC, USA.

• Paper 3: Luca Stabellini, “Energy Optimal Neighbor Discovery for Single-Channel Single Radio Wireless Sensor Networks“, in Proceedings of IEEEInternational Symposium on Wireless Communication Systems (ISWCS), Oc-tober 21 -24, 2008, Reykjavik, Iceland.

1.3. OVERVIEW OF THESIS CONTRIBUTIONS 11

Paper 1 proposes a spectrum sensing algorithm suitable for interference detec-tion in low complexity and energy constrained sensor nodes. The paper definesthe sensing algorithm and provides an analytical framework allowing to tune theparameters of the considered interference detection scheme so as to achieve a de-sired behavior while minimizing energy consumption. Results obtained during theexperimental evaluation of the developed procedure on real sensor motes are alsopresented. Paper 2 considers the problem of sensor networks initialization in pres-ence of interference and outlines the basic structure of an interference avoidancealgorithm designed for this purpose. Paper 3 provides the energy optimal imple-mentation of a combined neighbor discovery and topology control algorithm. Theauthor of this thesis developed all the original ideas included in these papers.

Chapter 3

Chapter 3 investigates the problem of networked estimation in the contest of dis-tributed spectrum sharing and analyzes how a set of estimation plants can share acommon channel. This investigation is presented in:

• Paper 4: Maben Rabi, Luca Stabellini, Alexandre Proutiere, Mikael Jo-hansson, “Networked Estimation Under Contention-Based Medium Access“,to Appear in International Journal of Robust and Nonlinear Control.

Paper 4 adopts an interdisciplinary approach and addresses the considered prob-lem from a joint perspective, considering both communication and control aspects.The author of this thesis developed the analytical models that have been usedfor quantifying packet delay and loss probability (the analysis was presented in apreliminary form in [43]): while carrying out this task valuable insight has beenprovided by Alexandre Proutiere. The effect of packet delay and losses over the per-formance of the estimation system has been quantified by Maben Rabi and MikaelJohansson that investigated the control-related aspects of the study. The paperwas jointly edited by the four authors.

Chapter 4

Chapter 4 considers frequency hopping transmission techniques and introduces anew adaptive frequency hopping algorithm: this algorithm has been presented in:

• Paper 5: Luca Stabellini, Lei Shi, Ahmad Al Rifai, Juan Espino, VeatrikiMagoula, “Utility-Based Adaptive Frequency Hopping“, submitted to IEEEInternational Symposium on Wireless Communication Systems (ISWCS), Septem-ber 2009.

This paper has been coauthored with the students of the wireless networkscourse. The author of this thesis proposed the original problem formulation andacted as leading author of the paper. Ideas were refined with the other coauthors,

12 CHAPTER 1. INTRODUCTION

that also developed the simulation code required to obtain the numerical resultspresented in the paper.

Chapter 5

Finally chapter 5 addresses the problem of sensor networks reprogramming andpresents the energy and complexity aware design of a coding solution based onfountain codes. The first part of the chapter deals with the optimization of thedegree distribution of fountain codes: this is described in:

• Paper 6: Michele Rossi, Giovanni Zanca, Luca Stabellini, Riccardo Crepaldi,Albert F. Harris, Michele Zorzi, “SYNAPSE, A Network ReprogrammingProtocol for Wireless Sensor Networks Using Fountain Codes“, in Proceedingsof 5th Annual IEEE Communications Society Conference on Sensor, Mesh andAd Hoc Communications and Networks (SECON), June 16-20, 2008. SanFrancisco, California, USA.

The author of this thesis developed the algorithm used for optimizing the consid-ered degree distribution, obtained the distribution that was actually implementedin the reprogramming protocol and edited Section IV of the aforementioned paper.While performing these tasks valuable insight was provided by Michele Rossi thatalso acted as leading author. The second part of the chapter presents additionalimprovements of the considered coding scheme: these aim at increasing the effi-ciency of the developed reprogramming protocol over multi-hop networks. Thisinvestigation has been included in P4 (see next subsection).

Other Related Papers

The following publications, although not included in this thesis, contain materialthat is similar or related to the aforementioned contributions:

P1. Luca Stabellini, “Energy Efficient Neighbor Discovery for Multi-Channel Single-Radio Wireless Sensor Networks“, in Proceedings of 8th Scandinavian Work-shop on Wireless Ad-Hoc Networks (ADHOC ´08), May 7-8, 2008, Johannes-bergs Slott, Sweden.

P2. Luca Stabellini, Alexandre Proutiere, “Evaluating Delay and Energy in Sen-sor Networks with Sporadic and Correlated Traffic“, in Proceedings of 7th

Scandinavian Workshop on Wireless Ad-Hoc Networks (ADHOC ´07), May2-3, 2007, Johannesbergs Slott, Sweden.

P3. Maben Rabi, Luca Stabellini, Peter Almström, Mikael Johansson, “Analysisof Networked Estimation under Contention-Based Medium Access“, in Pro-ceedings of the 17th IFAC World Congress, July 6-11, 2008. Seoul, Korea.

1.4. THESIS OUTLINE 13

P4. Michele Rossi, Nicola Bui, Giovanni Zanca, Luca Stabellini, Riccardo Crepaldi,Michele Zorzi, “SYNAPSE++: Code Dissemination in Wireless Sensor Net-works using Fountain Codes“, second submission to IEEE Transactions onMobile Computing, March 2009.

1.4 Thesis Outline

The remaining of this thesis is organized in two parts. The first one, comprisingChapters 2 through 5, highlights and briefly summarizes the performed studies:each Chapter contains short bibliographic studies that serve as a starting pointfor outlining the contributions in the different considered areas. The limitations ofeach contribution are also pointed out. Concluding remarks and open issues areoutlined in Chapter 6. The second part instead contains verbatim copies of all thepapers included in this thesis.

Chapter 2

Interference Avoidance ThroughDynamic Spectrum Access

Dynamic spectrum access has the potential to allow different classes of users to sharethe same pull of spectral resources and is today envisaged as a promising solutionto the current scarce utilization of many licensed frequency bands ( [22]). Algo-rithms exploiting the cognitive radio paradigm and allowing opportunistic spectrumaccess can however also be suitable for unlicensed scenarios and can be exploitedby frequency agile systems to avoid interference generated by co-located networks.In this chapter we investigate this possibility in the context of energy constrainedwireless sensor networks. In the following we outline our contributions with thisrespect and point out the limitations of our work.

2.1 Related Literature

In order to implement interference avoidance algorithms that can opportunisticallyexploit unused pieces of spectrum two main problems need to be addressed. A firstissue is connected to the identification of interference and spectrum opportunitieswhile a second problem involves the definition of communication schemes capableof utilizing the available resources. In the next two subsections we review worksthat have been considering the aforementioned problems.

Interference Detection

The problem of detecting interference in wireless sensor networks has previouslybeen addressed by several works that have proposed algorithms aiming at detect-ing different kinds of interfering activities. In order to review these works, we startby classifying the possible forms of interference: a first high level distinction canbe made among intra-network1 and inter-network interference. In the first case,

1Intra-network interference is sometimes referred to as self-interference.

15

16CHAPTER 2. INTERFERENCE AVOIDANCE THROUGH DYNAMIC

SPECTRUM ACCESS

transmissions of sensors belonging to the same network interfere with each otherwhile in the latter scenario interference is generated by devices that are not partof the considered sensor network. Inter-network interference can further be classi-fied in homogeneous and heterogeneous: the homogeneous scenario involves two ormore networks operating within the same radio standard while in the more generalheterogeneous case this condition does not hold and for instance the considereddevices might adopt different modulation schemes. Finally, we can also distinguishamong incidental interference, arising when transmissions of two or more networksincidentally overlap in time and frequency, and intentional jamming that is inten-tionally generated by malicious devices in order to corrupt communications of atarget network.

An algorithm for detecting intra-network interference has been proposed in[23]: authors have developed a scheme for identifying potential interference amongthe nodes of a sensor network and used this algorithm to design collision-freeTDMA protocols. Inter-network, homogeneous interference has been consideredin [24] where a protocol for detecting and mitigating interference among collocated802.15.4-based sensor networks has been proposed. The inter-network heteroge-neous case has instead been investigated in [25] where the problem of detecting WiFiinterference in IEEE 802.15.4-based sensor networks has been considered: differentinterference estimators based on received signal strength have been proposed andtheir effectiveness has been evaluated on real sensor nodes. The aforementionedworks always focus on incidental interference: intentional jamming has been in-stead considered in [26] where the feasibility of identifying jamming activities usingmeasurements of signal strength, carrier sensing time and packet delivery ratio hasbeen discussed.

Interference Avoidance

We here focus on the inter-network, incidental heterogeneous case: once interferencehas been detected, opportune schemes for avoiding interfering transmissions have tobe implemented. Two approaches have mainly been investigated so far. One possi-ble solution is to exploit the idea of channel surfing and implement frequency agilesensor networks that can avoid interfered frequencies selecting for their transmis-sions clear channels. This alternative, that basically aims at exploiting spectrumholes in the frequency domain, is investigated in [27] where two possible implemen-tation options are discussed: these are channel switching and spectral multiplexing;the first approach requires that all the nodes of the network switch channel afterinterference has been detected in a certain area of the network. The second solutioninstead allows only the sensors that are actually experiencing interference to selecta new channel: a connected topology is in this case maintained by boundary nodes(i.e. those sensors that have neighbors both in the interfered and not-interferedregion) that periodically switch their radio among the two channels used by neigh-boring nodes. We remark that both approaches require the existence of an already

2.2. ENERGY EFFICIENT DETECTION OF INTERMITTENTINTERFERENCE IN WIRELESS SENSOR NETWORKS (PAPER 1) 17

established topology and for instance assume that nodes are synchronized2. Adifferent solution is to avoid interference in the time domain: in this case sensornodes operate on a single channel and exploit spectrum holes in the time domain,transmitting in an opportunistic manner when interfering devices are silent. Thissecond option has been investigated in [29] where the possibility of reusing WLANchannels through dynamic spectrum access has been discussed.

2.2 Energy Efficient Detection of Intermittent Interferencein Wireless Sensor Networks (Paper 1)

Contribution

In this paper we propose a spectrum sensing algorithm suitable for detecting inter-network, heterogeneous interference. The scenario we consider consists of an un-licensed band partitioned in M orthogonal channels: these are shared by a set ofsensor nodes and a set of interfering devices. We model the channel occupancyusing a two-state semi-Markov model: at a defined time instant, a channel is in theBusy state if some of the interfering devices is transmitting packets and it is in theIdle state otherwise. Both an idle and a busy channel are perceived by a certainsensor node as white Gaussian processes with average power respectively equal toσ20 and σ

21 (similar assumptions are used in several other related papers such as [29]

and [30] as well as in standard documents of the IEEE [7]). We characterize theinterference experienced over a certain frequency band using the interference vectorψ, defined as:

ψ ,

(

ρ, γI =σ21σ20

)

where ρ ∈ (0, 1) denotes the average fraction of time during which the consideredchannel is on the busy state. Let’s now assume that the packet error rate PER(ψ)induced by a certain interference vector can roughly be estimated (or eventuallyupper-bounded) and that sensor nodes “perceive“ a channel as interfered or clear ifthe experienced PER is respectively greater than PERMax or lower than PERTol.This allows to identify over the interference domain ID, defined according to:

ID , {ψ = (ρ, γI) : ρ ∈ [0, 1], γI ∈ [1,+∞)}

the following two regions:

I ={

ψ : ψ ∈ ID, PER (ψ) ≥ PERMax}

C ={

ψ : ψ ∈ ID, PER (ψ) ≤ PERTol}

2Synchronization is here required in order to allow boundary nodes to receive packets fromtheir neighbors and avoid the multi-channel hidden terminal problem [28] arising when one nodeis transmitting but the intender receiver is listening on a different channel.

18CHAPTER 2. INTERFERENCE AVOIDANCE THROUGH DYNAMIC

SPECTRUM ACCESS

ρ

γI =σ21σ20

C

PI(ψ) = PI(ψMax)

PI(ψ) = PI(ψTol)

I

ψTol

ψMax

PI(ψ) ≥ PI(ψMax)

PI(ψ) ≤ PI(ψTol)

Figure 2.1: Sketch of the two regions (continuous lines) C and I defined on ID.The two dashed lines define two iso-curves that correspond to PI(ψ) = PI(ψMax)and PI(ψ) = PI(ψTol).

Using definitions analogous to the ones introduced in [32] we might call channelswhose interference vectors belong to C or I respectively white and black spaces.If we denote with PI(ψ) the probability3 that a certain channel is classified asinterfered, our objective is to design an algorithm such that (see Figure 2.1):

• if the interference vector of the tested channel belongs to I (thus the channelis a black space) then the channel is classified as interfered with probabilitygreater than a minimum threshold PMinD ;

• if a channel is classified as clear with probability greater than a referencevalue 1− PMaxF then its interference vector belongs to C (thus the channel issurely a white space);

• the energy cost ETot of the considered procedure is minimized.

In order to accomplish this objective, a sensor node performs spectrum sensingaccording to the scheme sketched in Figure 2.2.Note that intermittent sensing is used in order to cope with the intermittent natureof typical sources of interference affecting wireless sensor networks in unlicensedbands. Such a strategy allows to limit the use of the radio unit and reduces thusenergy consumption. With reference to figure 2.2 channel micro-samples xis arerandom variables that behave according to:

3The considered interference detection procedure will have a probabilistic outcome due topossible sensing errors and to the fact that channels present intermittent interfering activities andmight thus be sensed when interfering devices are transmitting or silent.

2.2. ENERGY EFFICIENT DETECTION OF INTERMITTENTINTERFERENCE IN WIRELESS SENSOR NETWORKS (PAPER 1) 19

t1 t2 tN t

y1 y2 yN

x11x12 x

1L x

21x

22 x

2L x

N1xN2 x

NL

Figure 2.2: Sketch of the channel sensing strategy used by our interference detectionscheme.

{

xi ∼ N(

0, σ20)

if the channel is Idlexi ∼ N

(

0, σ21)

if the channel is Busy(2.1)

while channel macro-samples yjs are defined by:

yj = I

{

L∑

i=1

|xji |2> ζ

}

(2.2)

I {·} being the indicator function. A channel is classified as interfered if the numberof macro-samples resulting in positive outcome is greater than a defined thresholdn, thus:

if∑N

j=1 yj > n the channel is classified as Interfered

if∑N

j=1 yj ≤ n the channel is classified as Clear

We provide an analytical framework that allows to select the parameters L, ζ, Nand n of the considered algorithm so as to satisfy the constraints specified above.In order to verify the behavior achieved by the developed interference detectionprocedure we implemented it on the TMote Sky sensor platform and run experi-ments over the 16 IEEE 802.15.4 channels in the 2.4 GHz ISM band. Examplesof the obtained results are shown in Figure 2.3 where we present the comparisonamong the experimentally estimated PI and the values computed analytically. Thegood match among experimental results and analytical model proofs the effective-ness of our algorithm that might for instance be used for performing clear channelassessment.

Limitations

We here outline the limitations of our contribution: we distinguish among limita-tions introduced by the used set of modeling assumptions and limitations connectedto the chosen interference avoidance approach.

In our analysis we have assumed that interfered frequencies behave accordingto a two-state semi Markov model and that both an Idle and a Busy channel are

20CHAPTER 2. INTERFERENCE AVOIDANCE THROUGH DYNAMIC

SPECTRUM ACCESS

γI [dB]

ρ

0 10 20 30 40 5010

−4

10−3

10−2

10−1

100

PI=0.95, Model

PI0.95. Experiments

Figure 2.3: Contour plot of PI = 0.95 over the interference domain (black line) andexperimentally estimated PI .

perceived as white Gaussian processes with average power equal to σ20 and σ21 respec-

tively. We further assumed that channel states in two consecutive sensing instantsare uncorrelated and that the considered state does not change while the channelis sensed. These assumptions might not hold in reality however, our experimentalevaluation has shown that these potential inaccuracies do not significantly affectthe behavior of the developed interference detection scheme. We also remark thatwhile evaluating the energy cost of our algorithm we adopted a simplified energymodel that might not fully capture the actual energy consumption of the sensingprocedure (we neglected for instance the energy required by the CPU to processthe collected channel samples as well as the eventual energy cost for switching on

2.3. INTERFERENCE AWARE SELF-ORGANIZATION FOR WIRELESSSENSOR NETWORKS: A REINFORCEMENT LEARNING APPROACH(PAPER 2) 21and off the radio unit of the sensor).

With respect to the chosen interference avoidance approach, our algorithm aimsat identifying and consequently avoiding interfered frequencies: this might representan effective solution only if the dynamics of interference change slowly over time.If the interference pattern is instead highly dynamic, it might not be possible toavoid interfered channels and exploiting spectrum holes in the time domain couldresult in better performance. In our work we have not investigated under whichconditions one approach outperforms the other and addressing this problem is leftfor future work.

2.3 Interference Aware Self-Organization for WirelessSensor Networks: a Reinforcement Learning Approach(Paper 2)

Contribution

In this paper we define an interference avoidance scheme that exploits the idea ofchannel surfing and allows frequency agile sensor nodes to avoid channels presentinginterfering activities (i.e. transmissions of other wireless devices). Our algorithmdiffers from the scheme presented in [31] (where the concept of channel surfing wasfirst introduced) since it adopts a receiver centric approach where each node onlyreceives on a single (clear) channel: this presents several advantages if comparedto the transmitter centric strategy considered in [31]. The greatest among those issurely the fact that our approach does not require synchronization and for instanceit allows to avoid interference even when the network is still unstructured or lacksa global synchronization scheme. We further propose a neighbor discovery algo-rithm that sensor nodes can use to establish or reestablish a connected topology4

in multi-channel networks. Multi-channel scenarios are likely to arise in presenceof interference due to the fact that nodes might use different channels in differentregions of the network. Providing a way for carrying out neighbor discovery thuscompletes the definition of our interference avoidance scheme. We formulate theproblem of establishing a connected topology as a reinforcement learning episodictask: we model the state Xi(t) of node i at time t using the pair:

Xi(t) = (|Ni(t)|, Xci (t)) (2.3)

|Ni(t)| here denotes the number of neighbors discovered up to time t (Ni(t) is theset of neighbors of node i) and Xci (t) is defined according to:

Xci (t) =

{

1 if∑

j∈Ni(t)Xcj (t) > 0 or if i is the network sink

0 otherwise(2.4)

4The word connected here is used to denote a network where each node is able to reach thesink either through single-hop or multi-hop communications.

22CHAPTER 2. INTERFERENCE AVOIDANCE THROUGH DYNAMIC

SPECTRUM ACCESS

and thus assumes value 1 if node i is connected with the sink (or if i is the sink itself).During each episode a node takes actions i.e. broadcasts discovery queries over theM available channels aiming at identifying its neighbors: the episode ends when apath to the sink has been found and the state variable Xci (t) is equal to 1. To eachaction a, thus to each of the M channels, node i associates a utility function uai ,reflecting the fact that neighbors have previously been discovered after transmittingon that channel: this utility is updated after every transmissions according to:

uai (t+ 1) =

{

α1 + (1 − α1)uai (t) if new neighbors are discovered(1 − α2)uai (t) otherwise

(2.5)

where α1 and α2 are two parameters to be fixed: a similar approach has alreadybeen used in [33]. Utility functions are then used together with an opportunepolicy for selecting the next action to be taken. In order to compare the behaviorof different policies, a simple simulation study has been performed: in particularwe compared the average time E[Tc] required to achieve a connected network withrandomly placed interfering devices for the four following policies:

• Deterministic Policy for which the sequence of actions to be taken is defineda priori and is not modified while the node is discovering its neighbors;

• Stochastic Policy that randomly selects actions with uniform probability dis-tribution;

• Greedy Policy that at each step always selects the action with the highestutility function;

• Soft-max Policy that uses a Gibs or Boltzman distribution and at time t

selects a certain action a with probability euai

(t)/τ

∑

beubi

(t)/τ, τ being a parameter of

the distribution;

More details on the setting used for the simulations are included in Paper 2. Ex-amples of the obtained results are shown in Figure 2.4: these outline that adoptinga learning approach that can exploit the information acquired during the neigh-bor discovery process for selecting on which frequency band looking for neighborscan reduce the time required to establish a connected network and consequentlydecrease energy consumption.

Limitations

Limitations of the considered interference avoidance approach, that aims at ex-ploiting spectrum holes in the frequency domain have been already outlined in theprevious subsection. We here focus on the proposed neighbor discovery procedure.

2.3. INTERFERENCE AWARE SELF-ORGANIZATION FOR WIRELESSSENSOR NETWORKS: A REINFORCEMENT LEARNING APPROACH(PAPER 2) 23

0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 0.1 0.4 2 80

100

200

300

400

500

600

700

800

α τ

E[T

c] [s

lots

]

DeterministicStochasticGreedySoft−max α=0.6

Figure 2.4: Average number of slots required in order to achieve a connected networkfor different kind of policies.

This algorithm is handshake based5 and selects the channel for broadcasting discov-ery queries using a reinforcement learning approach [34]. In particular, as describedabove, the selection of the frequency band used for each particular transmission isperformed using an opportune policy: this policy takes as input a utility function,associated to each channel and accounting for the number of neighbors that havebeen previously discovered on that frequency. This utility is increased after everytransmission if the taken action (i.e. the broadcast of a discovery query on a certainchannel) resulted in a reward i.e. in the discovery of new neighbors and decreasedotherwise. The whole procedure is stopped as soon as the node performing neigh-bor discovery has identified a path to the network sink. Traditional reinforcementlearning algorithms aim at maximizing a certain long term reward: this is howevernot strictly the case for our scheme. The considered stopping condition does notforce nodes to explore all the available channels and in fact might lead to undiscov-ered neighbors potentially resulting in inefficient topologies. This allows howeverto stop the neighbor discovery procedure, during which nodes are listening to thechannel and consume thus precious energy, as soon as a way to the sink has beenidentified. This tradeoff among the quality of the network topology and the energyspent on the neighbor discovery phase has not been investigated.

5In handshake based neighbor discovery nodes broadcast discovery queries in order to find outwho’s in their proximity. A node hearing a discovery answers for instance with an acknowledge-ment packet. This differs from one-way neighbor discovery where no active response is requiredand nodes simply broadcast “hello“ messages to inform their neighbors of their presence.

24CHAPTER 2. INTERFERENCE AVOIDANCE THROUGH DYNAMIC

SPECTRUM ACCESS

2.4 Energy Optimal Neighbor Discovery for Single RadioSingle Channel Wireless Sensor Networks (Paper 3)

Contribution

This paper considers the handshake neighbor discovery algorithm proposed in [35]and provides a way for optimizing its energy consumption. This algorithm combinesthe process of neighbor discovery with a simple form of topology control and worksin the following way: the plane around each nodes is divided into M equal conesand while looking for neighbors a node progressively increases the power used tobroadcast discovery queries until at least a neighbor in each direction (the numberof directions M being a parameter of the algorithm) has been identified or themaximum power level has been reached. We formulate the discovery procedure asa Markov decision process evolving through steps: at each step a node is asked toselect the power level used to broadcast a discovery query as well as the size of thecontention window that nodes eventually hearing its query will use to reply. Wemodel the state of the node at step k using the couple:

X(k) = (Xfound(k), Xpower(k))

where Xfound(k) ∈ (0,M) denotes the number of directions on which the node hasdiscovered at least one neighbor and Xpower(k) the maximum power level used up tostep k. Transition state probabilities, describing the probability that new neighborsare discovered in one or more of the missing directions, have been computed usingan analytical model that accounts for the used transmission power as well as for theselected contention window: we remark that long contention windows will preventcollisions among reply messages, allowing reliable neighbor discovery but resultingin high energy cost; shorter windows instead limit the usage of the radio unit andcan potentially improve energy efficiency but might also cause collisions and leadto undiscovered neighbors. This might affect the resulting topology and the energyefficiency of the data gathering process. The use of a contention window of variablesize represents the novelty of this work. We note that a similar problem has alreadybeen investigated in [36] that however considered a very unrealistic energy modelonly accounting for transmitting power consumption and neglecting the energy costrequired for listening. Authors of [36] have shown that the average energy cost of thediscovery procedure decreases for increasing node densities: this however does notreflect the fact that in densely deployed sensor networks, long contention windowswill be required in order to prevent collisions. This intuition is in perfect agreementwith our results that as shown in Figure 2.5 outline that higher node densities resultin higher energy cost.

Limitations

Optimal policies for the selection of transmitting power and contention windowsize have been obtained through dynamic programming [37]: the size of the used

2.4. ENERGY OPTIMAL NEIGHBOR DISCOVERY FOR SINGLE RADIOSINGLE CHANNEL WIRELESS SENSOR NETWORKS (PAPER 3) 25

6 8 10 12 14 1610

2

103

Node Density λ

Ave

rage

Ene

rgy

Cos

t

M=3M=5M=7M=9M=11

Figure 2.5: Average energy cost for the optimal power and contention windowselection policy. Different number of cones are considered.

contention window has been dimensioned in order to achieve a certain probabilityof not having collisions. These optimal policies however, can be computed only ifthe expected number of nodes hearing a discovery query is known: this requiresfor instance that the distribution of the nodes and the channel model are bothknown. Such an assumption (that was also used in [36]) is highly unrealistic andthus limits the contribution of our work. Furthermore, in our optimization we haveconsidered a single node perspective, where only a node at a time transmits queries:a more realistic network scenario should account for multiple transmitters actingsimultaneously and for the fact that packets might be lost due to collisions. Finally,as we mentioned above, in order to dimension the size of the used contention windowwe have fixed a certain probability of not having collisions among the transmittedreply messages. This value was empirically set and we have not investigated how itshould have been chosen: in fact also in this case (as already mentioned for Paper2) there is a tradeoff among the energy spent by nodes while performing neighbordiscovery and the quality of the resulting topology. Low probabilities of collisionsdemand high energy but ensure that all the neighbors are discovered; on the otherhand using shorter contention windows requires lower energy but might lead toundiscovered neighbors and affect the network topology.

Chapter 3

An Example of Spectrum Sharing:the Case of Networked Estimation

In this chapter we investigate the problem of networked estimation. In particularwe consider a scenario comprising a set of N estimation plants: each plant consistsof a sensor that samples the state of a certain system and transmits the collectedmeasure to an estimator. Samples are transmitted over a wireless channel that theconsidered N plants share using a contention based medium access scheme. Due tothe shared nature of the considered channel the transmitted samples might colliderequiring thus retransmissions: this will result in delays and eventually in the lossof some sample. Our aim is to investigate the dependencies among the performanceof the estimation plants, quantified in terms of average distortion of the consideredestimates, and the level of contention experienced over the used channel. We remarkthat our contribution could be seen under different perspectives: on one side, thesetting of the problem we consider basically provides an example of distributedspectrum sharing. On the other hand it gives insight on how to design a systemand chose its parameters (for instance the used MAC protocol or the samplingperiod adopted by the considered sensors) so as to minimize the effects of intra-network interference. We further outline that in this investigation, unreliability(i.e. estimates with high distortion) is induced by the contention among nodesthat belong to the same networked control system: this differs from the scenariowe outlined in Chapter 1 where instead packet losses were caused by inter-networkinterference.

3.1 Related Literature

Several works have considered the problem of state estimation in presence of obser-vation delays or losses and different settings (discrete or continuous time estimationin scalar or multidimensional systems) have been analyzed. For instance in [38],the effect of observation delays has been investigated for a continuous-time scalar

27

28CHAPTER 3. AN EXAMPLE OF SPECTRUM SHARING: THE CASE OF

NETWORKED ESTIMATION

system: assuming that the interarrival times of observations are exponentially dis-tributed authors have determined the minimum arrival rate that results, with highprobability, in an estimator error covariance that is bounded by a fixed threshold.A similar problem but in the context of multidimensional discrete-time systems hasbeen addressed in [39] where the effect of observation losses has been investigated.In this case authors have modeled the probability of receiving a certain observationas a Bernoulli random process with parameter λ and shown the existence of a criti-cal value for the observation loss rate below which the expectation of the estimationerror covariance is finite. Higher observation loss rates result instead in this expec-tation to be unbounded. For an overview of these results and other studies carriedout in the context of networked control systems the reader is referred to [40].

These works analyze the performance of the particular considered control sys-tems accounting for observation losses and delays that might be induced by in-terference, bad channel conditions (as an example, the effect of fading over theperformance of Kalman filter was recently investigated in [41]) or by contentionat the MAC layer. However, communication aspects are somehow decoupled fromthe real nature of the analyzed systems and for instance there is no attempt toactually quantify the entity of delays or losses in a particular real scenario. Withthis respect, only a simulation study aiming at analyzing the interdependenciesamong the estimation performance and the delays induced by the architecture of anetworked control system has been performed in [42].

3.2 Networked Estimation Under Contention-BasedMedium Access (Paper 4)

Contribution

In the context of networked estimation our main contribution is the analyticalcharacterization of the interdependencies among control and communication aspectsfor a particular class of networked control systems. As previously outlined weconsider, as sketched in Figure 3.1, a set of N sensors that periodically measure thestate of N distinct scalar systems and transmit their measurements to estimatorsusing a shared wireless channel.

The shared nature of the considered channel results in collisions among thetransmitted packets, introducing delays and potentially leading to packet losses.The entity of these delays and the probability of dropping some of the measurementswill in general depend on different parameters such as the number of sensorsN beingpart of the system, the access mechanism adopted by sensors at the MAC layer,the sampling period h and the eventual correlation among the instants of time atwhich measurements are taken. As an example in Figure 3.2 we show how thepacket loss probability Ploss varies as a function of the sampling period h for a fullysynchronized system (i.e. a system where all sensors generate a packet and thustry to access the channel at the same time) using slotted Aloha.

3.2. NETWORKED ESTIMATION UNDER CONTENTION-BASED MEDIUMACCESS (PAPER 4) 29

dx(1)t = ax

(1)t dt+ dW

(1)t

dx(2)t = ax

(2)t dt+ dW

(2)t

dx(N)t = ax

(N)t dt+ dW

(N)t

x(1)(

s(1)k

)

x(2)(

s(2)k

)

x(N)(

s(N)k

)

D(h,N)

Ploss(h,N)

E1

E2

EN

x̂(1)(t)

x̂(2)(t)

x̂(N)(t)

Shared channel, contention-based MAC

Figure 3.1: The estimation problem setup: the states of N identical plants areestimated via samples transmitted over a shared channel. Samples could be delayedand potentially lost because of contention.

0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7 0.810

−4

10−3

10−2

10−1

100

Sampling Period h [s]

Pac

ket L

oss

Pro

babi

lity

p los

s

N=2N=5N=25N=125

Figure 3.2: Sample loss rate in a fully synchronized system and periodic sampling.Slotted Aloha is used at the MAC layer.

Furthermore, the performance of the considered estimators will also be deter-mined by the particular nature (stable or unstable) of the sampled systems. Ac-counting for all these aspects we derive analytical expressions for the distributionof packet delay and loss probability (a preliminary version of the developed ana-lytical framework was also published in [43]): we then investigate how the averageestimator distortion defined according to:

30CHAPTER 3. AN EXAMPLE OF SPECTRUM SHARING: THE CASE OF

NETWORKED ESTIMATION

0 0.02 0.04 0.06 0.08 0.10

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

80

90

100

Sampling Period h [s]

J e

N=2N=5N=25

Figure 3.3: Average estimation distortion Je as a function of the sampling periodh for an unstable system. Nodes are synchronized and use slotted Aloha.

Je ,1

N

N∑

i=1

lim supM→∞

1

M

∫ M

0

E

[

(

x(i)t − x̂

(i)t

)2]

dt (3.1)

is affected by these two metrics. An example of the obtained results is providedby Figure 3.3 where Je is plotted as a function of h: note that in all the presentedcurves, an optimum sampling period, balancing the generation of new samples withthe losses induced by the contention access mechanism can be identified.

Limitations

We here outline the limitations of our contribution: these basically lie in the set ofmodeling assumptions used in the performed investigation. For analytical tractabil-ity we have considered a time-slotted system where all sensors are synchronized.This does not allow to account for packet losses induced by partial superpositionamong packets of different nodes and provides thus an optimistic estimate of ob-servation delay and loss probability.

Chapter 4

Utility Based Adaptive FrequencyHopping

In this chapter we consider frequency hopping (FH) transmission techniques andaim at designing an interference aware frequency hopping algorithm. Frequencyhopping is becoming a popular solution for interconnecting wireless devices oper-ating in unlicensed bands. In fact, the growing interest for this technique is wit-nessed by the recent proliferation of radio standards and communication protocolsadopting hopping schemes: examples are the IEEE 802.15.1 [8] and the WirelessHART [10] radio standards as well as the TSMP (Time Synchronized Mesh Pro-tocol) protocol [19]. The basic idea implemented by this scheme is to allow twoor more nodes to communicate through synchronous hopping over a defined setof channel (the hopset). The resulting frequency diversity guarantees a certainresilience against packet losses induced by interference. However, performance offrequency hopping systems can be severely degraded if some of the channels be-longing to the hopset is constantly experiencing bad conditions for instance due tothe presence of frequency static interfering devices or unfavorable fading. Adaptivehopping techniques can in these cases be exploited to mitigate such problems: wehere outline our contribution with this respect.

4.1 Related Literature

Several adaptive hopping algorithms have been proposed during the last years.The basic idea implemented by these schemes is to identify bad channels i.e. forinstance those frequency bands where nodes experience a high packet error rate andconsequently remove them from the hopping pattern. Adaptive hopping techniquesare included in the specification of many frequency hopping standards availabletoday such as IEEE 802.15.1 and Wireless HART.

The basic structure of these adaptive algorithms typically comprises three steps:assuming as a reference case the Adaptive Frequency Hopping specifications in-

31

32 CHAPTER 4. UTILITY BASED ADAPTIVE FREQUENCY HOPPING

cluded in IEEE 802.15.1 we have:

• channel classification, through which the channels belonging to the hopsetare classified and ranked based on a defined metric (for instance packet errorrate);

• channel classification information exchange, through which the nodes belong-ing to the network exchange their channel classification;

• hopping sequence adaptation, through which bad channels are removed fromthe hopset.

Several variants of this basic adaptive technique, aiming at improving its per-formance in presence of co-located networks or frequency static interfering deviceshave been proposed in the literature. For instance the Interference Source OrientedAdaptive Frequency Hopping (ISOAFH) scheme was defined in [44]. Based on theconsideration that each IEEE 802.11 channel overlaps with 22 of the frequenciesused by IEEE 802.15.1, the original hopset is divided into groups. The channelclassification procedure rather than identifying individual bad channels aims thenat localizing the WLAN carrier(s) and consequently avoids hopping over the in-volved group of channels. The idea of Adaptive Frequency Rolling, was introducedin [45]: in order to mitigate mutual interference among different networks the orig-inal hopset is partitioned in several orthogonal groups that are assigned to theconsidered piconets adopting a time division scheme.

All these procedures are basically on-demand algorithms that require the def-inition of an “initiating condition“: this has to be fulfilled in order to start theadaptive scheme. Furthermore, the new hopping sequence can be defined only afternodes have performed the channel classification. This introduces delays and slowsdown the process of interference avoidance. Finally, if channel conditions change,in order to allow for adaptation a new classification needs to be performed.

4.2 Utility Based Adaptive Frequency Hopping (Paper 5)

Contribution

Our main contribution is the definition of an interference aware adaptive frequencyhopping algorithm that overcomes the limitations outlined above. We have assumedas a reference case the IEEE 802.15.1 radio standards, thus considering an hopsethaving cardinality M = 79, and developed an adaptive hopping technique: thisdoes not require a dedicated channel classification phase due to the fact that nodesconstantly maintain estimates of channel conditions (i.e. of the packet error rateexperienced on each frequency of the hopset). These estimates are then mapped toa probability density function defining the usage probability of each channel andassigning higher usage probability to channels where nodes experience lower packeterror rate. This mapping procedure is implemented using the following expression:

4.2. UTILITY BASED ADAPTIVE FREQUENCY HOPPING (PAPER 5) 33

f : PER(x)→ f (PER(x)) =(1− PER(x))α

∑M=79y=1 (1− PER(y))

α(4.1)

that basically utilizes the estimated PER as a utility function. We note that thisapproach differs from traditional adaptive techniques where channels unsuitable fortransmissions are removed from the hopset while the remaining frequencies are allused with equal probability. We compared the performance of our algorithm withthe ones of traditional frequency hopping techniques as well as with the adaptivehopping implementation included in the specifications of IEEE 802.15.1 [8] showingthat our approach leads to lower packet error rates: an example of the obtainedresults is presented in Figure 4.1 where we show the PER achiever by the threeconsidered solutions in a frequency selective fading channel.

2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16 18 20

10−2

10−1

100

SNR [dB]

PE

R

IEEE 802.15.1IEEE AFHUBAFH, α=0.5UBAFH, α=1UBAFH, α=4

Figure 4.1: Packet Error Rate as a function of average received SNR.

We further remark that our algorithm does not involve any on-demand pro-cedure: this might reduce the time required to adapt the hopping pattern andpotentially allows for tracking varying channel conditions.

Limitations

The proposed algorithm introduces additional complexity due to the fact that nodesconstantly need to maintain and exchange estimates of channel quality and computethe utility associated to each of them. Furthermore, the channel used on each hopis synchronously selected by the nodes of the considered network using a commonseed: this is used to generate random numbers that on each slot allow to chose thecarrier to be used for the upcoming packet transmission. Implementing the randomnumber generator required for this purpose might represent a non-trivial task in

34 CHAPTER 4. UTILITY BASED ADAPTIVE FREQUENCY HOPPING

complexity constrained devices and the frequent generation of random values mightintroduce significant energy overhead. While gains resulting from this new adaptivetechnique have been evaluated and quantified in different channel scenarios, wehave not considered the effect of the added complexity that might in fact representa limiting factor for the practical implementation of the considered procedure incomplexity constrained devices such as sensor nodes. Furthermore, the algorithmhas been mainly developed for two-node topologies: while we believe that thisscenario arises in many practical applications, we are aware that this limit the valueof our contribution and that the algorithm should be applicable also to networkscomprising more than two nodes.

Chapter 5

Energy and Complexity AwareDesign of Fountain Codes forSensor Network Reprogramming

This Chapter considers the problem of energy efficient and scalable sensor networkreprogramming. Such a service, that is extremely valuable in large sensor networkswhere the manual reconfiguration of every node might not be feasible, requires codeupdates to be delivered over-the-air in an energy efficient, reliable and scalable man-ner. This task presents however several challenges: the typical size of code updatescould be in the order of some Kilobytes while the packet size commonly used bysensor devices is 20 to 100 Bytes. This means that the original program imageneeds to be partitioned in order to be transmitted and that opportune algorithmsfor code dissemination have to be designed. It should be noted that if code dissem-ination is performed on densely deployed networks, several nodes might transmitat the same time resulting in packet collisions. Traditional protocols for sensor net-works reprogramming [46]- [49] prevent this problem by adopting mechanisms forintelligent selection of senders and recover eventual data losses using NACK-basedARQ techniques. However, for high node densities or if bad channel conditionsarise (for instance due to the presence of external interference) the performance ofthe aforementioned reprogramming schemes are degraded by the so called feedbackimplosion problem [50] induced by the fact that many of the originated NACKcontrol messages collide and are thus lost. This issue is solved in [51] by usinga data dissemination scheme exploiting fountain codes. We here summarize ourcontribution for the development of this reprogramming protocol.

5.1 Background and Related Literature

Fountain codes [52] are random linear codes that basically implement a Hybrid ARQstrategy and provide an effective solution for point to multi-point data dissemina-

35

36CHAPTER 5. ENERGY AND COMPLEXITY AWARE DESIGN OF

FOUNTAIN CODES FOR SENSOR NETWORK REPROGRAMMING

tion over binary erasure channels1 [53], [54] that perfectly suits the challenges ofsensor network reprogramming. The encoding procedure exploits the Digital Foun-tain paradigm introduced in [55] and is carried out in the following way: a filethat has to be disseminated (for our problem setting, the code update) is initiallydivided in K packets of equal length. The source transmits a certain number ofcoded blocks: each coded block yn is obtained as follows:

• first a block degree dn is randomly selected in the range {1, . . . ,K} accordingto an opportune degree distribution ρ(d): dn basically defines how many ofthe original K packets will be combined to obtain yn;

• then dn packets are randomly and uniformly selected among the K availableand the coded block yn is simply obtained through the bitwise modulo 2 sumof these dn packets.

The information identifying which packets have been used to obtain a certaincoded block defines the encoding vector and has to be known at the decoder2.The decoding process can be simply carried out by inverting the decoding matrixG obtained using the received encoding vectors, i.e. by solving on x the systemy = Gx; y and x respectively contain the received encoded blocks and the K originalpackets that will be retrieved once the decoding is completed. This task can forinstance be accomplished by means of Gaussian elimination and back-substitution.Note that this is possible only if the matrix G has full rank requiring thus that atleast K linearly independent coded blocks are received at the decoder. As outlinedabove coded blocks are obtained by randomly combining a certain number of theoriginal packets: in practice this might lead to linearly dependent combinations andin fact, N ≥ K coded blocks will have to be correctly received in order to allow todecode the original file.

The performance of a data dissemination algorithm exploiting fountain codescan be quantified using two metrics:

• the first one is the decoding overhead H defined as:

H = N −K (5.1)

denoting the number of additional coded blocks needed to properly decodethe original file;

• the latter is the decoding complexity, characterizing the complexity (for in-stance in terms of binary XOR operations) of the decoding process.

1In a binary erasure channel packets are either completely lost with a certain probability(referred to as erasure probability) or correctly received.

2Note that this can be achieved either by piggybacking on each coded block the particularused encoding vector or by simply communicating which seed has been used to initialize therandom generator used during the coding process, allowing thus the decoder to reproduce thesame sequence of random numbers used at the encoder side.

5.1. BACKGROUND AND RELATED LITERATURE 37

These two quantities are strongly dependent on the chosen decoding approach3

as well as on the adopted degree distribution which optimization is therefore a keyissue that needs to be addressed. This problem has for instance been consideredin [56] and [57]: authors of [56] provided a method for computing degree distribu-tions minimizing the decoding overhead of LT codes. This however is effective onlyfor messages of small length (i.e. small K) and in fact its complexity exponentiallygrows for higher K and becomes prohibitive for K > 30. An optimization schemeadopting a simulation approach that exploits importance sampling has been pro-posed in [57] and has been used to optimize the degree distribution of LT codes.In both cases authors achieve low decoding complexity by considering a messagepassing decoder (which is suboptimal in terms of overhead) and try to obtain smalldecoding overheads by optimizing the considered degree distributions. This ap-proach however might not represent the best solution for the scenario we considerthat typically involves small K: as already outlined, in these conditions LT codesresult in high decoding overhead and affect the efficiency of the data dissemination.A better solution could be to adopt a Gaussian elimination decoder and optimizethe chosen degree distribution so as to reduce the decoding complexity while main-taining low overhead.

A further problem is connected to how such a coding solution, exploiting foun-tain codes, is practically implemented. As outlined above fountain codes are randomlinear codes that require thus the use of a random number generator. This needsto be initialized with a seed: accurate choice of such seed is extremely importantsince for instance bad seeds might produce several linearly dependent coded blocksand decrease the performance of the dissemination procedure. Moreover, the choiceof the considered seed should be made accounting for the multi-hop nature of thedata dissemination and for instance seeds on adjacent links might be matched inorder to allow the recovery of corrupted information through overhearing.

3Different decoders can in fact be implemented: methods that aim at solving the system ofequations y = Gx, such as for instance Gaussian elimination are optimal in terms of overhead(meaning that any K linearly independent coded blocks are sufficient for recovering the transmit-ted file) but result in high computational complexity. For instance for Gaussian elimination thenumber of operations required to retrieve the original file is O(K3): for high K this results inprohibitive complexity and alternative approaches have been developed. One of this approaches isimplemented by LT codes [52]: these make use of a message passing decoder that is sub-optimalin terms of overhead but achieves significantly lower decoding complexity if compared to Gaussianelimination.

38CHAPTER 5. ENERGY AND COMPLEXITY AWARE DESIGN OF

FOUNTAIN CODES FOR SENSOR NETWORK REPROGRAMMING

5.2 SYNAPSE: A Network Reprogramming Protocol forWireless Sensor Networks Using Fountain Codes(Paper 6)

Contribution

Our main contribution for the development of the reprogramming protocol pre-sented in [51] is the optimization of the degree distribution of the used fountaincodes. In order to obtain degree distributions leading to both low decoding over-head and low decoding complexity we developed an optimization algorithm. Thisalgorithm adopts an iterative simulation approach that starts from an initial distri-bution which performance are progressively improved. In particular, during eachiteration, a certain number of transmissions is simulated: the ones leading to favor-able outcomes (i.e. resulting in low decoding overhead and decoding complexity)are selected and used to obtain a new distribution that is then used in the successiveiteration. The process continues until no further improvements are possible or acertain stopping criterion is met. We compared the performance of our optimiza-tion procedure with the one achieved by the algorithm proposed in [57]: examplesof the results obtained during this comparison are presented in Table 5.1 where theaverage decoding overheads for the two optimization schemes are shown. We herehave considered an LT decoder and a particular class of sparse degree distributionwhere only degrees that are power of 2 have non-zero probability of being selected.This comparison outlined the f